1. Technical Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mobile telecommunications network and, in particular, to the provision of variable charging rates within such a network.
2. Description of Related Art
A "radio interface" or "air interface" provides the connection between a particular mobile station traveling within a particular cell area and the base transceiver station (BTS) providing radio coverage for that particular cell area. Within both analog and digital communications systems, the number of frequency channels allocated for effectuating air-interfaces with mobile stations traveling within a particular cell area is fixed. Because of this limitation, mobile service providers often employ a number of channel resource management schemes to better utilize and to manage these valuable channel resources. One such scheme includes imposing different tariffs or charging rates for calls depending on the time of the day or day of the week. For example, during business hours a larger number of mobile subscribers tend to use their mobile stations, and the use of channel resources is maximized. As a result, the air-time is considered as "peak" hours and mobile subscribers are charged at a higher rate. After business hours, a lesser number of mobile subscribers tend to utilize their mobile service. The air-time is then considered as "off-peak" hours and mobile subscribers are charged at a lower rate. The main rationale behind these charging plans is based on a predicted or estimated intensity of the usage of the finite number of radio channels available within the coverage area. Accordingly, the serving mobile service provider utilizes the differences in charging rates to discourage the use of valuable channel resources during peak hours and to encourage the use of under-utilized channel resources during off-peak hours.
However, it has been shown that such a prediction or estimation of channel utilization is not always accurate or uniform. As an illustration, a first cell covering a mostly residential area might have a lower load even during the peak hours. A second cell covering a mostly business area might have a high-fluctuation load level throughout the day. Therefore, even in periods with a low resource utilization level, subscribers are discouraged by the associated high air-time rate from using otherwise idle resource channels. Furthermore, after implementing such a system, all cells associated within a particular serving area are globally affected by the imposed system regardless of their individual call load. However, a charging plan affecting all of the associated cell areas globally when each individual cell has a different load and resource utilization level does not provide an optimum channel resource management scheme.
There is a need then for a mechanism to selectively provide different charging rates or plans per each cell depending on the associated call load.